In fourth grade, she sat in the car and cried.

“What’s wrong, sweetheart?”

“I can’t tell you.”

“Why not?”

“Because…you’ll hate me!”

“No, sweetie…there’s nothing in the world that would make me hate you! Tell Mama what’s wrong.”

“I like to look at pretty girls.”

There it was. The fork in the road. I wasn’t necessarily surprised. She was always a butterfly dancing in the wind. There was great sadness she tried to hide. I didn’t always understand her creativity, her mood, her fierce intellect. She was simultaneously immensely brave and terribly fearful. She could read at the tender age of seventeen months. And when she walked into a room full of people, she could FEEL all their feelings. When she took tests in school, her brain felt like 100 television sets were broadcasting different channels and her job was to pick which one had the right answers. 

My baby girl. The one I waited so long to have. My last child.

She was an exceptionally beautiful baby. Strangers would cross the street just to stand near us and look in her eyes and smile. She was what is commonly referred to as an “old soul”. She was incredibly sensitive.

When she was in sixth grade, she cried on the steps of the school instead of joining in the class dance. In high school, I held her when she cried at the injustice of being called a “stupid effing Jew”. In adolescence, she struggled mightily. In college, they diagnosed her learning disability and she received accommodations. Things finally became a little easier for her. The room full of TV’s reduced to just five.

She thought she needed to be something she wasn’t in order to receive the approval of others. Maybe I wasn’t openly accepting enough of her 4th grade confession. Maybe I tried to sweep it under the rug. If I did, it wasn’t because I wouldn’t love her if she was gay. It was because I knew she would face more challenges in life by others who wouldn’t accept her. And I hated that for her. She had already been through so much when I was ill, and then when her father and I divorced. For whatever reason, we didn’t really talk about it again till after a terrible breakup with a guy who drank too much and mistreated her. That brought her to her knees.

I’ve always told her, she reminds me of that punching-bag Bozo the Clown we had when we were kids. Whenever she got knocked down, she came right back up. Every. Single. Time. I’m so proud of her. And when she finally found *K*, I was thrilled. Because she blossomed. She is who she really IS with her. They are so good together. They lift each other up and celebrate each other. They work toward their goals. They are best friends and they love and respect each other deeply.

I will never forget the day she called me and said, “Mom, are you sitting down?”

With slight trepidation, I said, “Yes.”

“I’m going to ask *K* to marry me!”

OMGosh! My heart exploded for her. After watching her struggle for all those years, trying to find herself, she was finally there. The rest of the conversation was filled with “congratulations” and “when is the wedding” and “what are your plans”. 

I’ve had many prayerful moments about this. I am a Christian. In my prayers, I asked God to tell me what to do. I had people actually tell me I should just send them each a wedding gift and not go to the wedding. I’ve had people tell me we’re all going to hell. That’s not what God told me. He reminded me HE gave me this child to love and care for and protect…forever. And that’s what I will do…forever.

She called me in tears the other night regarding the impending confirmation of a Supreme Court Judge who is not supportive of the LGBTQ community, tipping the majority. She asked, “What if they delegitimize our marriage???” Imagine her fear…her sadness…her frustration. I paused, took a deep breath, and said, “Sweetheart, nobody can ever take away the love you and your wife have for each other. NO ONE can take away your relationship. I don’t know what will happen to the paper that joins you. I don’t know what will happen in the courts and in the country and in the world. We’ll just pray that everything works out.” I do know this…God loves them, just as He loves all of us.

I don’t have all the answers. I’m just a mom who loves her daughter to the moon and back. I want her to have the freedom to love who she loves…the same freedom I have and you have. I will fight for the rights of my children. When it is my time to stand before God and have a reckoning of my life, I will tell Him I loved the babies he gave me…no matter what…and I tried to do the best for them. That’s the best I can do.

❤️

“There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love. We love because he first loved us.”

1 John 4:18-19 NIV